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The Privileged Planet: How
Our Place in the Cosmos is Designed for Discovery

Guillermo
Gonzalez
Jay W. Richards

"The Earth is a very small stage in a vast
cosmic arena Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the
delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are
challenged by this point of pale light." (Carl Sagan,
Pale Blue Dot, 1994)

Is Earth merely an insignificant speck in a vast and
meaningless universe, as Carl Sagan suggested? On the contrary, in
The Privileged Planet: How Our Place in the Cosmos Is Designed
for Discovery, astronomer Guillermo Gonzalez and philosopher Jay
W. Richards present a staggering array of evidence that exposes the
hollowness of this modern dogma. They demonstrate that our planet
is exquisitely fit not only to support life, but also gives us the
best view of the universe, as if Earth-and the universe itself-were
designed both for life and for scientific discovery. In fact, Earth
is a lot more significant than virtually anyone has realized.

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Book

Today, most scientists and philosophers claim
that Earth is an ordinary speck of dust adrift, without purpose
or significance, in a vast cosmic sea.

This idea (popularized by the late astronomer
Carl Sagan) is an outgrowth of the naturalistic philosophy that
has dominated science for the past 150 years. Yet, remarkable
evidenceunveiled by contemporary astronomy and physicsmay
now tell a very different story.

Building upon the overwhelming success of Unlocking
the Mystery of Life (widely acclaimed as the most effective
refutation of Darwinian theory ever produced), this
hour-long documentary explores the scientific evidence for intelligent
design and purpose in the universe. In the process, Earth is revealed
as far more than the product of time, chance, and random natural
processes.

We now know that a rare and finely-tuned array
of factors makes Earth suitable for complex life. We depend on
our planet's oxygen-rich atmosphere, its large moon, its planetary
neighbors, and its precise location within the solar system and
Milky Way galaxy. But the story does not end here. For the same
factors that make a planet like Earth hospitable to life also
provide the best conditions for scientific discovery.

Is this correlation merely a coincidence? Or does
it point to a deeper truth about the purpose of the cosmos and
the reality of a transcendent designer? The answer could dramatically
affect 21st century science.

Through stunning computer animation, interviews
with leading scientists, and spectacular images of Earth and the
cosmos, The Privileged Planet explores a startling connection
between our capacity to survive and our ability to observe and
understand the universe. A connection that points directly to
the work of a creative mind and plan.

This extraordinary documentary will be a focal
point in the excalating debate between evolution and design.

2004
(Hardcover) Regnery Publishing, 464 pp.

In this provocative book, readers are taken on
a scientific odyssey from a history of tectonic plates, the wonders
of water, and solar eclipses, to our location in the Milky Way,
the laws that govern the universe, and the beginning of cosmic
time.

You will discover:

How Earth is precisely positioned in the Milky
Way-not only for life, but also to allow us to find answers
to the greatest mysteries of the universe

" Striking ways in which water doesn't
behave like most other liquids-and how each of its quirks makes
it perfectly fit for the existence of creatures like us

The harmony of Earth and the Moon: how they
work together to sustain Earthly life as one intricate system-and
how that system produces the best solar eclipses just where
there are observers to see them

How Earth's atmosphere helps protect us from
harmful radiation, yet has a tiny window open to the radiation
crucial for life and scientific knowledge

How Jupiter and Saturn protect Earth from cataclysmic
destruction

Why the best scientific evidence refutes the
misnamed Copernican Principle-the widely held idea that there
is nothing special about Earth or its place in the universe

How the laws and constants that govern the
universe must be narrowly fine-tuned for the existence of any
complex life

Copernicus: how the popular idea of his achievement
and its significance contains more ideologically skewed myth
than historical fact

Why the sheer number and size of galaxies does
not mean that Earth's capacity to sustain life is just the result
of blind chance

In a book of magnificent sweep and daring, Guillermo
Gonzalez and Jay Richards drive home the argument that the old
cliché of no place like home is eerily true of Earth. Not
only that, but if the scientific method were to emerge anywhere,
Earth is about as suitable as you can get.

Recommendations"This thoughtful, delightfully
contrarian book will rile up those who believe the 'Copernican
Principle' is an essential philosophical component of modern science.
Is our universe designedly congenial to intelligent, observing
life? Passionate advocates of the search for extraterrestrial
intelligence (SETI) will find much to ponder in this carefully
documented analysis."
- Owne Gingerich. Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics,
author of The Book Nobody Read: Chasing the Revolution of Nicolaus
Copernicus.

"This new book is an excellent and timely
contribution to the broadening and increasingly important discussion
of origins."
-- Henry F. Schaefer III, Graham Perdue Professor of Chemistry.
Director, Center for Computational Quantum Chemistry, University
of Georgia. Five-Time Nobel Prize Nominee

"Privileged Planet is simply a beautifully
written piece of work: so lucid and compelling in its presentation
that even the most lay of laypersons will fly through its pages,
barely able to put the book down. And when is the last time that
hard science has delivered such an optimistic, even joyful message?
For Gonzalez and Richards have made the incontrovertible case
that this earth of ours is not just some flyspeck of inconsequentiality
in a meaningless universe, but holds a rare, even honored place,
and that we, its inhabitants, are especially privileged to be
here."
-- Joshua Gilder, Former White House speech writer. Author of
Heavenly Intrigue: Brahe, Kepler and the Birth of Modern Science

About
the AuthorsJay W. Richards
Jay W. Richards is Vice President and Senior Fellow of the Discovery
Institute in Seattle. He received his Ph.D. with honors in philosophy
and theology from Princeton Theological Seminary, where he was
formerly a Teaching Fellow. He is the author of many academic
articles, popular essays, and op-eds, on topics as diverse as
science, philosophy, and theology. He is editor and contributor,
with William A. Dembski, of Unapologetic Apologetics: Meeting
the Challenges of Theological Studies (InterVarsity Press 200),
editor and contributor with George Gilder of Are We Spiritual
Machines?: Ray Kurzwell vs. the Critics of Strong AI (Discovery
Institute Press, 2002), and author of The Untamed God: A Philosophical
Exploration of Divine Perfection, Immutability, and Simplicity
(InterVarsity Press, 2003)

Guillermo Gonzalez
Guillermo Gonzalez is an Assistant Professor of Astronomy at Iowa
State University, He received his Ph.D. in Astronomy in 1993 from
the University of Washington. He has done post-doctoral work at
the University of Texas, Austin and at the University of Washington
and has received fellowships, grants and awards from such institutions
as NASA, the University of Washington, Sigma Xi (scientific research
society) and the National Science Foundation.

Dr. Gonzalez has extensive experience in observing
and analyzing data from ground-based observatories, including
work at McDonald Observatory, Apache Point Observatory and Cerro
Tololo Interamerican Observatory. He has also published over sixty
articles in refereed astronomy and astrophysical journals including
Astronomy and Astrophysics, Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical
Society, Astrophysical Journal and Solar Physics. His current
research interest in astrobiology focuses on the "Galactic
Habitable Zone" and captured the October 2001 cover story
of Scientific American.

Another area of his research is focused on analyzing
and interpreting ground-based photometric and spectroscopic observations
of low and intermediate mass stars in relation to current theories
concerning the late stages of stellar evolution and the formation
and evolution of planetary systems.

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